DE PALMA ATTENDED 'FRANCES HA' SCREENINGNOAH BAUMBACH'S LATEST THIS PAST THURSDAY AT MUSEUM OF MODERN ARTAccording to the Huffington Post's Regina Weinreich, Brian De Palma was in attendance this past Thursday for a special screening of his friend Noah Baumbach's latest film, Frances Ha, which was written with Greta Gerwig, who stars in the film. The screening took place at New York's Museum of Modern Art. Others at the screening included Ben Stiller (a regular collaborator of Baumbach's), Mike Nichols, Diane Sawyer, Ann Roth, David Chase, and Sting (whose daughter, Mickey Sumner, plays Gerwig's best friend in the film). Baumbach and Gerwig have been doing a lot of print promotion for the film, with a big interview story in the April 29 issue of The New Yorker, as well as a New York Times article, and another profile in the May 17 issue of Entertainment Weekly.

SPIELBERG HEADING CANNES JURY THIS MONTHSAYS HE HASN'T BEEN ON A JURY SINCE AVORIAZ, WHEN PRIZE WENT TO 'CARRIE'Steven Spielberg will head the jury at the Cannes Film Festival this month. An AFP article translates things Spielberg said in a pre-Cannes interview with the French arts magazine Telerama. Spielberg tells the magazine that he will be a "democratic" jury chairman. "But give me a bit of time," Spielberg is quoted in the AFP translation. "I haven't been on a jury since the Avoriaz festival in 1986, when we gave the prize to Carrie, by Brian De Palma. I'm a little rusty."

Something seems lost in translation there, however, as the festival Spielberg is talking about was in 1977, when he was jury president at the Avoriaz Fantasy Film Festival. De Palma's Carrie was given the Grand Prize, and Sissy Spacek received a Special Mention for her role as the title character. A Special Jury Prize was given to Larry Cohen's God Told Me To. And if that seems like a dream of a festival right there, check this out: at the 1975 Avoriaz fest, Roman Polanski was the jury president, and the Grand Prize went to De Palma's Phantom Of The Paradise, while the Special Jury Prize was shared by Cohen's It's Alive and Saul Bass' Phase IV.

As for Cannes this year, Spielberg told Telerama, "I believe that, before they are shown, all films are equal. Whether they are small or big, they are a sum of the personal visions and collaborative efforts. Each time the filmmaker's intentions are the same, whether it is Christopher Nolan or Michael Haneke: to express what he has inside."

Spielberg left for the festival about a month ago from Ft. Lauderdale, sailing on his 282-foot yacht, named the Seven Seas, which is, according to the New York Post, equipped with "a computer-controlled anti-seasickness system under the hull." Spielberg plans to sail the world with his wife and some of their kids following the Cannes fest. Initial rumors as Spielberg left were that he would host screenings of some of the Cannes films for jurors on the yacht, but those rumors have since been denied. But the yacht does have a 3D movie theater. And, according to Roger Friedman, the yacht also has a poolside movie screen. "It boasts luxury amenities for 12 guests," states Friedman, "with a crew of 26. There is a large master stateroom with a study and private deck, a helipad, indoor cinema and an infinity pool with a 15-foot glass wall that converts to a movie screen so the director and his guests can take in a film while swimming.”

"There's a bit of a connection based on my conversations with these two wonderful gentlemen to a film called Phantom of the Paradise," Williams said, referring to his starring role in the 1974 movie, "where . . . I think the sense of the mask and working from behind the mask may have been born." Williams said he became addicted to attention when he found success, becoming better at "showing off" than "showing up," and praises Daft Punk for obscuring their identities. "On that level, I love that they choose to be anonymous," he said. "They disconnect who they are to allow you to experience what they create."

EDITOR RECALLS SEEING 'SISTERS' WITH MALICK"NEITHER OF US HAVE BEEN AS FRIGHTENED AS WE WERE BY THAT MOVIE"

The Playlist's Diana Drumm posted an interview today with Billy Weber, who has worked as editor on several of Terrence Malick's films. Drumm caught up with Weber at this years TCM Classic Film Festival. In the following passage, Weber recalls attending an early Los Angeles film festival called FilmX to catch a midnight screening of Brian De Palma's Sisters:

"A screening of Brian DePalma’s Sisters helped cement the friendship between Weber and Malick 'I was hired by someone named Bob Estren, who was the original, first editor on Badlands, who hired me to be his assistant... Before they started shooting, I had to go pick up a check from him to go get the editorial equipment to rent and so I went to the house he was staying in at the time and that’s how I met Terry,' Weber said. 'Then he went off to shoot the movie and I didn’t see him again until he came back and then we almost immediately became close friends, just have been close friends ever since.'

'While we were working on Badlands, we came to Grauman’s Chinese, to the theater we screened in today, to a midnight screening of FilmX, which was an early L.A. film festival, to see Sisters which Ed Pressman (producer on Badlands) had produced, Brian De Palma had directed. The two of us came together to see it. To this day, neither of us have been as frightened as we were by that movie. It was so scary, so good… We talked about this a year ago, we’ve been friends ever since.'”

RUMORS OF DTK SOUNDTRACK NEXT WEEKINTRADA FORUM TEASES EXPANDED REMASTER OF "EARLY 80S THRILLER" FOR MAY 14In a post today on the Intrada Soundtrack Forum, Roger Feigelson teased information about an upcoming Intrada release for May 14 (this upcoming Tuesday). "One Special Collection title," he wrote. "A reissue of an early 80s thriller. This one took a long time because initially all we could find was the album master, but we really wanted to expand it. Finally, after extensive searching we found the 24-track masters of everything but the main and end title. The LP master was a little reverby, but everything else is now heard in crisp, detailed sound -- and much longer. Probably the most important work that emerged from this famous composer/director relationship." For several forum members, that last sentence immediately brought to mind Brian De Palma's 1980 thriller Dressed To Kill, with its masterful score by Pino Donaggio. An expanded remaster of this classic soundtrack would be most welcome-- we'll be awaiting a full announcement.(Thanks to Randy!)

R.I.P. MARIO MACHADOL.A. NEWS ANCHOR HAD ROLES IN SEVERAL FILMS, INCLUDING 'SCARFACE'

Mario Machado, seen at left in the above still from Scarface, died Saturday in California of complications from pneumonia, according to the Los Angeles Times. He was 78. Machado had roles as anchormen or TV interviewers in several other films, including, most memorably, in the RoboCop series of films. The L.A. Times obituary notes that Machado "had been ill for some time with Parkinson's disease."

BOSTON GLOBE SAYS 'PASSION' JULY 3RDAND TIME OUT NY CALLS 'PASSION' ONE OF 30 COOLEST THINGS TO SEE THIS SUMMERMost of the summer movie previews have been listing Brian De Palma's Passion as a vague July release, with the exact date to be determined. While sites such as Rotten Tomatoes and Coming Soon.net continue to list Passion as a limited release beginning June 7, The Boston Globe's summer movie preview, posted yesterday, has the film slotted squarely for July 3, which is a Wednesday, and is also the day before Independence Day. Passion might be considered counter-programming for that day's big tentpole release, The Lone Ranger, starring Johnny Depp, except it will likely be on far fewer screens, in far fewer theaters. Also opening that day is Despicable Me 2. Opening a mere five days prior to July 3 are two other films expected to do big business: White House Down, with Jamie Foxx and Channing Tatum, and The Heat, the comedy which pairs Sandra Bullock with Melissa McCarthy. The Globe's line on Passion reads, "Things get hot and heated between ad agency head Rachel McAdams and Noomi Rapace, her protégée (consider that a euphemism)."

Meanwhile, Time Out New York includes Passion on its list of "The 30 coolest things to see this summer." The article was written by David Fear, Joshua Rothkopf, and Keith Uhlich, and we have a feeling that the latter probably wrote the following passage recommending Passion: "Returning to the genre he does best, Brian De Palma concocts a deliciously catty erotic thriller, about an advertising-agency protégé (Noomi Rapace) out for revenge against her manipulative boss (Rachel McAdams). Throat-slitting straight razors and sapphic sex scenes are, of course, included."